WordPress releases “Benny”, 4.0

On September 4th, WordPress announced the launch of their new version named Benny after Benny Goodman (jazz clarinetist and bandleader). This new version introduces some features to give users a smoother experience while managing their WordPress website or blog.

Coppertops have updated all of our websites to 4.0, with the usual testing necessary after any update to ensure there are no ill effects! For those of you now using 4.0, we’d welcome your thoughts below on whether it has achieved it’s aims!

Media Management

The media library now boasts an endless grid layout, with details preview. The aim here is to make it easier to view all of your images, check details easily, and quickly select the correct image for your purpose.

Embedding

Personally this is the one that caught my eye when I first scanned the release update from WordPress. This update means that you can add a YouTube video, a tweet from Twitter, a talk from TED and many more just by pasting the relevant URL on a new line within your page or post! The visual editor will even display a preview of embedded content. Very nifty, as the web moves increasingly towards multimedia content obsession!

Editor

Plugins

Similarly to the media library update, there is a layout change here which shows an icon image and details in a grid layout. WordPress also claims to have introduced new metrics and improved their search, initial usages supports this on my part at least!

Acunetix reviewed Benny without getting too excited as there are no security updates in this release. However they recommend, as always, that you update to the latest version to maintain security on your website. They are reasonably impressed with the changes to the UI.

As with any release, however, it is highly recommended that you test the functionality and look of your site after applying the update to ensure that the changes applied have not broken any of your existing features.

With my IT background and love of good design, I take pride in putting together highly professional websites that work well for their owners. My coding background lets me hook things together for effectiveness, efficiency and ease of use. My history with data management means I have a good understanding of search optimisation. I mainly use WordPress as a baseline to ensure all of these qualities, with customisations to suit.